Review of Operations

Tata Steel Thailand (TSTH)

The Group’s equity in Tata Steel Thailand (TSTH), headquartered in Bangkok, is 67.1%. It has three main subsidiaries SISCO, NTS and SCSC.

The impact of the global economic downturn has been felt more severely in the TSTH performance. The total production reduced by 22% (1.07 million tonnes) while sales at 1.1 million tonnes were lower by about 20% as compared to last year. TSTH launched various initiatives in the market place to understand the buying behaviour of the end-users better in order to produce a stronger value proposition. Examples include increasing sales from the cut and bend centre, conducting a retail value management programme, strengthening the brand equity of the ‘Bor-Lor-Sor’ brand and developing a network in the neighbouring countries of Laos, Cambodia, Myanmar and Vietnam.

Mini Blast Furnace

In an attempt to bridge the gap between steel making and rolling mill capacities, to reduce the dependence on scrap and to meet the special steel requirements of the customers, TSTH is in the process of setting up a 0.5 mtpa mini blast furnace. This project is likely to begin its operations by the end of the second quarter of FY 10.

Continuous Improvement Initiatives

Over the past year, the operations in Thailand focussed on cost reduction in the rolling process scheme by optimising the roll consumption cost and in the Alloy consumption scheme at the steel shop. The operations achieved a Fe-alloys consumption of 12.6 Kgs/tonne (13.6 Kgs/tonne last year) and roll consumption of 26.2 Kgs/tonne (28.7 Kgs/tonne last year).

Safety

TSTH achieved a LTIF of 3.01 in the year and initiated initiatives like the line risk assessment for all
work activity according to TIS 18000 and the Implementation of the ‘Why-Why’ analysis.